Are You Crazy!
by Knights of Cydonian Starlight
Summary: When Reid's health begins to decline, he wonders whether or not it is due to physical or mental complications. But what happens when Reid has to profile… himself?
1. Doctor, I'm Not Crazy

Sara: Hey! First Criminal Minds fanfic... if we get a review or two on this first chapter we'll update again.

Sky: But if there's no response from you guys, then we won't continue writing this.

Sara: So it's like a mixture of a whole bunch of Reid-centric episodes: Elephant's Memory, Corazon, etc. Let's just say it takes place just before Prentiss is 'killed off'.

Sky: Which we all know she wasn't.

Sara: Yeah... so read and review, and we'll update is we see some feedback :3

Sky: Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is not ours.

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><p>Are You Crazy?<br>Chapter 1: I'm Not Crazy

_Doctor Reid, you may have to consider that what you're experiencing is due to… mental complications._

_But there's nothing wrong with me, Doctor! I have extreme sensitivity to light and sound, but that doesn't mean I'm crazy! Listen, I know what mental disorders are all about, my mother has schizophrenia! I'm not crazy, Doctor._

_I didn't say you were, Dr. Reid, you just have to consider the possibility that something is seriously wrong…_

But Reid didn't want to consider the possibility. He didn't want to think of _anything_. All he could concentrate on was the pulsing, the throbbing in his head that was going to drive him insane itself. An hour ago he had swallowed a handful of aspirin dry, but there was no indication that the medicine would kick in any time soon.

A car passed by his DC apartment, and he winced. What should sound like only a breath of wind to a healthy person sounded like the roaring of a two-ton steam engine to Reid. He clutched the sides of his head and fell to the floor, cowering against the cold wood. His phone rang in his pocket, and he cringed away from it as the beeping pierced his skull like a steel dagger.

"Hello?" he answered in a whisper, his voice coming out hoarse and low.

"Hey, pretty boy, we have a case," Morgan said loudly, and Reid held the phone away from his ear, wanting to retch because of his spinning head. "I hope you're talking like that because you're in bed with somebody right now and you don't want to wake her up… or him, for that matter, I wouldn't know since you've never been able to score with _anyone_ in the years that I've known you." Morgan laughed, and the sound grated through Reid's brain, frying it.

"I'll be right there," the doctor said instead, his head reeling in pain. "Just… just cover for me if I'm late, okay?"

Another chuckle. "She had better be worth it." And he hung up.

./. .\.

"Kill me… _just kill me you son of a bitch!_"

Dominic smirked at his victim and pressed the tip of his dagger harder into the boy's bloodstained throat.

"That's it," he simpered. "_Beg_, you fucking bastard, _beg_ for mercy, _beg_ for me to save your worthless life. I want you to scream my name. I want you to wish that you were never born." And he slashed down with the knife, tearing the teenager's already ripped shirt and leaving a deep cut in the skin. His victim shrieked in pain, which only earned him another harsh slap across the face. He ran his tongue over the fresh cut along the inside of his cheek, the bit of blood being the only liquid he had consumed all day.

"_Beg!_" Dominic screamed. "Beg just like you made me beg when and your _friends _beat me in the locker rooms! Beg, and I_ just might_ deem you worthy of living."

"Never, you son of a bitch!" the other shouted. He knew it was going to end, and soon, and he welcomed the thought of the obliviousness of death compared to the hideous pain he was in now…

Dominic snarled and sliced the knife toward his victim's throat. The boy fell off the chair with a strangled sort of gurgle, and just like that he didn't have any breath to beg _with_.

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><p>Review please, and you <em>just might<em> get another chapter ;)~


	2. It's None of Your Damn Business

Sara: And thank you everyone for reading! So here you go, this is the second installment of this story. I'm sorry for its being really boring, I just had to set the scene up like they do in the show :P

Sky: And none of my best editing techniques could salvage the beginning, though I have to say I quite like the ending.

Sara: And also, we're sorry if we sounded like we were begging for reviews in the first chapter. We just wanted to know if you guys liked what you saw and if the story was worth continuing.

Disclaimer: We don't own Criminal Minds.

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><p>And now for reviews ~<p>

Crazy CM Fan 100: We're glad you like it! Sara likes to make the beginnings of her stories very dramatic, what's the point of setting the scene when it's supposed to grab the readers' attention?And thanks for the warm welcome :)

zikki4ever123: We love that part too! (We just love Morgan and Reid in general) The lines were inspired by previous episodes, but we put our own little spin on them :)

Greg'sgirl5: We hope this chappie doesn't disappoint! :)

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><p>Are You Crazy?<br>(Originally this chapter was supposed to be named 'Yes, I'm Wearing Sunglasses at Night, but It's None of Your Damn Business' but unfortunately it couldn't fit in the bar. So it was shortened to:) It's None of Your Damn Business

"Victor Burgess, seventeen years old. Found this morning in a New York City dumpster, multiple lacerations. Cause of death was a single cut to the throat. Pierced the jugular, and the kid bled out." JJ pointed a remote at the flat screen TV, bringing up more horrific images. JJ continued, "There have been a total of five deaths in New York so far. All teenagers, from age sixteen to eighteen, but none of them have consistent similarities besides the range of age."

JJ looked to the rest of her team, surveying their reactions to the brutally mutilated bodies of the kids. However, being good at their jobs, the six agents all had on the same smooth, plain expression.

"Where's Reid?" Prentiss suddenly noticed, looking around for the scrawny nerd.

"Why have the police only contacted us now?" Morgan asked then, drawing the attention away from Prentiss's question. The agent looked at him quizzically, but he merely shrugged.

"The police didn't connect the murders as being from the same unsub until now," JJ answered. "All different causes of death, all different high schools and so on."

"So why did they change their mind?" Hotch asked, peering at the files before him.

JJ hesitated, but then finally said, "The unsub left this at the last crime scene." She pointed the remote at the television again and the image of a bloody note dominated the screen.

"_Dear Boss,_" JJ read aloud. "_How can you, the police, let such animals, such insensitive cruel excuses for people walk free among the rest of us who are innocent? Each time you fail to act, another person suffers as a consequence. The longer you do not act now, the more frequently I will kill. You can't keep me waiting forever._"

"Jack the Ripper style," Rossi mused almost to himself. "But the way the unsub kills is quite different. It's impulsive. In Burgess's home there was no sign of forced entry, so he must have known the unsub. He was led to the basement, where the unsub tortured him with a knife. Then he suddenly slits Burgess's throat and tosses him carelessly into a dumpster. Why?

"Something like this takes a lot of anger," Prentiss added. "The unsub lost control, which means that this was personal. How were the other four killed?"

"The first one, Emily Chazen, sixteen years old." A picture of a pretty and oh god curvy girl appeared on the screen, tied up and gagged. And it looked like a few of her fingers were missing… "She was beaten and sexually assaulted, then fed her own fingers. Cause of death: cyanide. She was dumped in the middle of Central Park and hidden underneath some bushes and leaves.

"The second was Eugene Coulange, age eighteen. He was found in his own room. He was… sexually assaulted and shot multiple times in the torso. Cause of death: the bullet severed a major artery in Coulange's leg. He bled out in a matter of seconds.

"Karina Manetas, age seventeen, was found in the trash bins outside of her parent's home. She was dismembered with what looks like a chainsaw, but she wasn't alive when it happened. Her windpipe was crushed, so she suffocated. She put up a hell of a fight though. There were defense wounds on her hands and arms and some skin cells were found under her fingernails. Forensics is looking for a match now.

"Emmett Falke was found in the gymnasium of the private school he attended. He…" JJ's voice faltered and she fought hard at the bile that threatened to claw its way up her throat. "He was stripped naked and hung from the ceiling. The unsub carved the word _injustice _on his chest."

"So this guy wants to find justice?" Rossi scoffed. "From the sound of it he makes his victims suffer, but death is quick, except for Manetas. The suffocation must have been an accident because she fought back, unlike the others. It's like he feels guilty about what he's doing, so he stops the pain as quickly as possible."

"This unsub out for revenge," Prentiss supplemented. "These kids must have done something to him in the past, and now he's retaliating. Most likely he comes from an abusive family. He's smart because he plans all of the kills carefully, but his emotions get in the way so his something always goes wrong when he's ready to execute. "

"And considering where he dumped the bodies, he must live somewhere in the center of the city," Morgan supplied. "But the homes of Karina Manetas and Eugene Coulange are on the outskirts of town, so it seems like he has no specific comfort zone."

"These kills are escalating in severity and frequency. The gap between kills is now about a day."

"So we have less than twelve hours before another kid is killed?" Morgan asked, disgusted.

"We need to act fast, then," Hotch said, then ordered, "Morgan, you call Reid, drag him here if you have to. Garcia, I want you to look up any high school child who lives in a single parent home, and who has needed counseling, possibly for anger management issues or bullying."

Garcia nodded and fled to her computer room. Morgan sighed and picked up his phone.

"Let's take the jet," Hotch said with a ringing finality.

./. .\.

"There you are, genius!" Morgan groaned in relief. "Where the hell were you? I can't cover for you forever!"

"Sorry Morgan," Reid answered, evading the question. Dark sunglasses shielded his eyes, even though it was pitch black outside, and his voice was still a harsh whisper.

"Hey, anything wrong?" the doctor's best friend asked in concern. "You look sick. And why are you wearing sunglasses _at night_?"

"I'm fine, it's just a little headache," Reid said bitingly. "And it's none of your goddamn business if I wear sunglasses at night."

The man walked off, ramming into Prentiss's shoulder on his way to the jet. She raised her eyebrows at Morgan.

"What's up with him?" she asked.

Morgan shrugged. "As if I know."

./. .\.

Dominic was afraid. No, he was goddamn _terrified._

His backpack was slung carelessly over his shoulder, and inside was a (nearly) failed literature exam and an (almost) aced calculus exam. Even though the latter grade made up substantially for his lacking in any reading, writing, or art class, he knew his mother wouldn't be pleased.

And he knew, God he knew, that when his mother wasn't pleased he would be in a lot of pain.

He tried to remember the night before, when he had killed Victor Burgess. God, that felt _so good_ that another person who had made his life a living hell was _gone_. He remembered the _power_ he felt when he held the knife up to his throat and beads of blood collected there. He was in total control, unlike when Burgess and his friends decided to strip him and beat him unconscious in the locker rooms last year...

He walked cautiously home, in case one of the kids from school decided to sneak up behind him and tape a _Kick Me_ sign on his back or something childish like that. But really, he just didn't want to be home. But you can't prevent the inevitable.

Dominic didn't announce that he was home in a futile hope that his mother wouldn't notice if he stole into his room without supper. Well, he knew she wouldn't mind the supper part; his not eating would save her a bunch of cash at the end of the month.

But her mother stood, tall and skinny, in the kitchen, a soaped cast iron pan in her hands. She was waiting for him, he knew, and she would want to know what his exam results were. So he threw the tests on the table and ran up the stairs to his room, fumbling with the lock as his mother shrieked in disapproval...

She was _fast_. And she had the face of an angel, and when she was happy she could be a total sweetheart. But something happened when Dominic's father died when he was only seven, and she had snapped. Now she was a cutthroat bitch, and when she was angry her wrath was like a never ending wave. No, it was a _tsunami_.

His mother made it up the stairs in less than half the time that he had, and was forcing his door open before he could even lock it. For his resilience, she pounded him over the head with the pan.

Jesus Christ, did it _hurt_. Stars blinked in front of his eyes and he staggered backward, allowing his mother inside. Her face was beet red and her golden locks quivered as her fury made her lash out at her son again and again with the heavy pan until her arm was shaking with the strain of holding it. She cursed how _stupid_ her son was, why couldn't he at least make _something_ of himself, he was just like his father, _careless_.

She finally left Dominic in silence, and the boy recoiled into the floor, his whole body positively screaming. Had he ever had a beating as bad as this? He couldn't think of one, so he just assumed that his mother was unhappy about something else other than her son for once.

_Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck._

He had tried to sit up, and his vision blurred and faded to black at the edges. He fell backward onto the floor and his injured shoulder blades burned as they made contact with the cold planks. He wondered dully if any of his bones were broken, because he would have to treat them, yet he could hardly go to a clinic to do so.

Why didn't he just go? Run away, to never see his mother again? He wanted to see that plump, girlish face turn pink as his father kissed her, not flushed with anger. His heart longed to be loved by his own flesh and blood... And if he left he would have to go to a foster home to be adopted by a nice family and then dropped off in the street again as a delinquent. And his mother would be put in jail and... and he didn't want that, to see her in an orange jumper and behind bars with God knows who.

He couldn't do that to his mother, his only living flesh and blood, who had loved him in the first seven years of his life.

./. .\.

The team sat around in the BAU's private jet, getting cozy while looking over the files of the five murdered children.

"… so all these kids don't have anything in common." Morgan continued his statement, eyebrows furrowed in concentration. The late hour was getting to all of them except for Hotch and Rossi, who looked like they could be fully functional without sleep for another week or so. "Different schools, different social classes, completely different lives, it seems."

"Could this be just a series of random murders?" Prentiss asked with the same expression as Morgan, grimacing into her already cold cup of coffee.

"But the anger shown in the kills indicates that the victims knew the unsub. And there's what's said in the note, so the unsub must have experienced something that made him think that the victims were, to quote, _insensitive and cruel excuses for people_," JJ countered sadly. So the team was back at square one.

"Garcia, do you have anything for us?" Hotch said, rubbing his forehead and probably worsening the deep wrinkles he already had. _What_ did these victims have in common?

"Nope. Nada. Zilch," the technical analyst answered as her fingers danced across her keyboard. "The victims haven't crossed paths even once in the past year."

"Widen the search," ordered Rossi. "Look for anything that seems similar going five years back."

"Gotcha." Garcia's now fire red curls bounced as she nodded. "Be back in a jiffy! Take care, my lovelies."

As the computer screen went blank, the five agents looked to the doctor in search of answers. Reid's head was bowed over an open file, and he stared blankly at the mutilated corpse of Karina Manetas, not really seeing the sickening image. He sat in the dark, the sunglasses still veiling his eyes.

"Hey genius, have you got any genius ideas?" Morgan joked halfheartedly. He earned a few half smiles in return.

Reid started and looked up at them as though he'd been in a trance. His vision blurred and he saw white spots instead of the outlines of his team. Nevertheless, he rubbed his eyes, cleared his throat and said, "What if the victims had nothing in common? That's all we've been searching for so far. So… so what if they hadn't crossed paths before, they just all happened to meet the unsub themselves?"

The rest of the team sat in silence, contemplating the out-of-the-box yet very practical idea.

"_That_," Morgan said finally, grinning, "is why I call you a _genius_."

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><p>Sara: Aaaaaah I love the ReidMorgan/Prentiss scene again xx And the Dominic scene, even though, poor boy, I hurt him D: I hate doing that, but you'll see how it works out in the future. We _hope_ to update soon, but I've just hit a writer's block wall, so maybe it'll be another week instead of another day. Anyway... enjoy! Reviews are always welcome ~


	3. Meet the Parents

Sara: And the third installment is here! Thank you thank you thank you for all your positive responses! We're so very happy that you enjoy our work :3

Sky: Once again, dull dull dull chapter. We're sorry guys. I like some of the lines in here though... and the French accents :P

Sara: Right... Disclaimer: We DO NOT own Criminal Minds. But we would be so happy if we did.

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><p>Reviews ~<p>

Paige Louise Jordan: Haha, thank you! Sara was kind of nervous about the last chapter, but we're glad you liked it! :) We hope this one is just as good.

luvnumb3rs: (PS we love Numb3rs too!) We're glad you like it! Hope this update is good too :) *eskimo kisses*

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><p>Are You Crazy?<br>Chapter 3: Meet the Parents

_Beep!_

_Crash!_

_Will you watch where you're going, you damn bastard!_

"Ah, the sounds of the city," Morgan sighed contentedly, breathing in the smog-permeated air.

"What's so great about this place?" Reid wondered aloud. He internally winced as another lance of pain flashed behind his eyes. "It's filthy, it's bright, it's noisy…?" As if to back his statement up, his vision fuzzed at the edges when he looked at the brightly-coloured sign of a strip club.

Morgan sighed again, this time in exasperation. "New York City is home to the Statue of Liberty. The Empire State Building. _Broadway_."

"Technically, the Statue of Liberty doesn't reside in the city," Reid pointed out in his usual I-swallowed-a-textbook tone. "It's in the Hudson Bay."

"Enough, you two," Hotch snapped in annoyance. "You can argue about this when we get home, but now I want you to focus on the case."

"Yes, boss," the two agents chimed tonelessly.

The BAU team walked into a tall block of a building. Outside stood two mean looking officers in dark blue gear. They glanced at the agents in contempt, as though they didn't _deserve_ to be in _their_ headquarters.

However, the scene inside was different. The lobby was fully encased in elegant marble, and men in suits and uniforms greeted them with happy smiles. A particular man, who was maybe in his late twenties or early thirties, stepped up to shake their hands. His new NYPD badge was polished until it gleamed, and at the position he was standing the badge reflected a stream of light into Reid's eyes. He flinched and quickly sidestepped to save himself from having to palm another handful of aspirin later.

"Good evening, Officer Cazaly," JJ began. "My name is Jennifer Jareau, I spoke to you earlier on the phone? And these are Special Agents Aaron Hotchner, David Rossi, Derek Morgan, Emily Prentiss, and Dr. Spencer Reid."

"Welcome to New York," Cazaly said, acknowledging the other agents with a nod of his head and clasping JJ's hand. "I hope you were fully briefed about the situation?"

"Yes."

"So you know that, except for the note, there's absolutely no indication that any of these murders are connected," the officer said slowly, as if he were talking to a child with a mental handicap.

"Tell him your genius idea, Reid," Morgan said, frowning. This guy was doing to be difficult. He just hoped that the man wouldn't get in the way of the investigation later.

"Erm…" Reid stalled. His head was muddled by all of the light and sound his brain was processing, so it was hard to concentrate. "We think… no I think, but I think the others think the same way as I think… we think that the victims weren't connected in any way except for the unsub. He's the only connection that we should be looking for."

The team looked at Reid in surprise. Stuttering was very normal to expect of the child prodigy when he was nervous or anxious, but now he sounded confused, slow. What had happened to their genius, Dr. Spencer Reid? Did he hit his prodigal head on the way to the jet?

Reid paid no attention to his friends' speculative glances but surveyed the officer from behind his sunglasses. The man looked apprehensive, as well as irritated.

"Well that's just great!" he exclaimed, sarcasm dripping from his tone. His contempt was nearly tangible in the stuffy but air-conditioned air. "That leaves us with how many suspects? Just about every damn high school kid in New York City!"

"Our technical analyst is narrowing that list down as we speak." Reid sounded just as annoyed, but that was because all he wanted to do was get the hell out of there and sleep for the next thousand years.

"Burgess came from a poor family of French immigrants. Chazen was from a rich, and I mean _filthy rich_ family. Country clubs and parties every other weekend and such. Karina Manetas was from a middle class family, who owns a small hair salon in the city." Cazaly ticked off different details of the victims' lives, as if the team hadn't already memorized the files already. He led them into what looked like a conference room with a simple oval table and a projector with a screen.

"The parents of Victor Burgess will be here in a few minutes," Cazaly said with a grave expression on his prematurely lined face. "Be prepared for a lot of tears and swearing... in French." He closed the door behind him, leaving the team to spread their files out on the table.

"So what do we have to go on?" Hotch asked, casting hawk-like eyes at them.

"Nothing," Morgan deadpanned. He made a motion as if to run his fingers through his hair, though he had none. "_Absolutely nothing_. This kid changes his MO and his victimology like Reid changes his mismatched socks. There's no way we can track someone like this."

"Then how do we narrow down the suspect list?" the team leader pressed.

"Well we can assume that he's around sixteen to eighteen, considering the age of his victims," Prentiss said with an air of desperation.

"And he suffers from bullying. As Reid said earlier, he may have an abusive parent and may take counseling for his anger," JJ said.

"And he's smart," Reid added tonelessly. "He's smart, but emotional. And from what it sounds like, he's going to kill a lot more people before he's satisfied."

"Hey, Garcia?" Rossi called. He'd had her on speaker phone the whole time. "Are you getting all this?"

"Yes sir, and I'm running through names as we speak."

"Look for someone who's recently lost a loved one, and who's been at the wrong end of a reported case of bullying in the central New York area."

"Roger that. Penelope Garcia, off for now."

"So while Garcia's checking through New York's high school system, what do we do?" JJ asked. "Look through some files and hope that we get lucky?"

But then there was a crash, a muffled sob, and a furious shouting that seemed to get louder by the second. Hotch sighed and rubbed his temples.

"We talk to the parents."

./. .\.

Since JJ was deemed the 'sympathetic' one of the group and Morgan just needed his goddamn answers, they were paired up to talk to Victor Burgess's parents. The rest of the team split up to examine the crime scene and look through the hundreds of thousands of files of every high school child in New York City.

The couple was simple, with ragged old-fashioned clothing and a stuffy French-y air to them. The woman was sobbing without abandon into a filthy handkerchief, and the man looked like he could have bowled down the entire police force if he wasn't being carefully watched by an armed officer.

"Good morning, Mr. and Mrs. Burgess," JJ began, holding out her hand. "My name is Jennifer Jareau and this is Special Agent Derek Morgan, and we would like to ask you some questions. But first, we're so, so sorry for your - "

"MY BOY EEZ DEAD!" Mr. Burgess roared like an angry bull. His heavy accent made it difficult to understand what he was saying, and he talked fast in this moment of anguish. "My only son eez _dead_ and all _you_ can do eez stand 'ere and say 'I'm so sorry!'"

JJ withdrew her hand and looked at the parents evenly, but Morgan spoke before she had the chance.

"Listen, Mr. and Mrs. Burgess," he said impatiently. "We are doing everything we can to find who did this to your son. But in order to do so we need to ask you some questions."

"Victor was a good boy!" Mrs. Burgess cried. "He worked so 'ard to learn Eengleesh and keep up with his schoolwork and then… and then…!" She howled again, and her husband patted her back soothingly.

"We weell answer your questions," the man said, his tear-streaked face in a rigid mask. "But you 'ave to promeese us that you weell catch the keeler, and you won't stop unteel you do."

"We promise," JJ said quickly. "This way."

The agents led the parents to a small interrogation room, and they sat across from each other, sizing each other up.

"Has your son ever been… aggressive?" Morgan prodded gently. "Like a bully?"

"NO!" Mrs. Burgess shrieked immediately, her already high voice escalating another octave. "My son would never 'urt a fly!"

"Are you sure, Mrs. Burgess?" JJ pressed. "Because we have reason to think that he was harassing someone."

"He was… aggressive, yes," Mr. Burgess finally admitted. "Only eef he was angry, though. He would only shout for a beet, but then he would be just anuzzer school boy."

Morgan made a mental note of this. He was pretty sure that Victor Burgess was more than a docile 'school boy'.

"And do you know of anyone who would want to hurt your son?"

"N-no," the boy's father stammered. "No one 'as never threatened Victor before, and we don't know of anyone who would want to 'arm heem."

But before Morgan or JJ could ask another question, the door opened and Officer Cazaly poked his head through the doorway.

"You guys better come and see this," he said heavily. His shoulders slumped as he leaned against the frame. "They just found another body."

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><p>French accent typing! Annoying maybe, but we love it. Thanks for reading! Reviews are always welcome :)~<p> 


	4. Help Is on the Way

Sara: Yes, the title is named after a Rise Against song :P We do that a lot with our titles. I love Rossi/Reid's interaction.

Sky: Haha. Reid sounds extra pissy in this chapter. Disclaimer: We do not own Criminal Minds.

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><p>Reviews~<p>

Abigail: Thanks for reading! We hope you like this chapter too! :)

Rebecca: You have no idea how Sara love love loves the Morgan/Reid relationship :) They're just so adorable together.

italiachick13: Yay updates! :3 We hope this is good ~

Crazy CM Fan100: Thanks still :) Sara's kind of stuck now, she's debating what to write next :/ but we won't abandon this story :)

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><p>Are You Crazy?<br>Chapter 4: Help Is on the Way

Dominic's hands smarted and stung after he played with the wires. He looked back to the body, soaked in water and urine. The boy was still mumbling incoherently, barely gripping onto consciousness and life itself. He didn't know where he was and he didn't care, because his body was on fire with the pain he was in. But another shock made him jolt awake again, and he howled as more burns bloomed on his bare chest. He had given up hope a long time ago that someone would hear his screams.

Dominic was still hurting from his beating last night. But he continued to dig the wires into his victim's wet skin, reveling in the pained sounds the boy was making. It was like a drug, this adrenaline. He kept at it until the boy was finally silent, eyes open and glassy but not seeing anything at all.

./. .\.

"Dominic Beecher," the teacher said in a bored tone as he continued with the roll call.

"Here," Dominic said just as dully back. He was in Language Arts, by far his worst and most hated subject. Whenever he tried to read the text the teacher had assigned him, the letters seemed all jumbled up and out of order, so he often stumbled over the words and messed them up completely. Then the class would laugh and the teacher would give him a disapproving glance. What did it matter to him that Dominic had undiagnosed dyslexia? All that he cared about was the paycheck that came in every month.

And writing, oh god writing. Dominic's handwriting was illegible at the best of times, and at others it was just a whole bunch of indistinct scribbles. Typing didn't help him either – though he was good with computers, the words would just fail him. And the teacher would too.

"Alec Chistyakov."

No answer.

"Chistyakov?" the teacher said again, pronouncing the name with a horrendous accent and tapping his pen against his desk with an annoying clicking sound.

"No Alec, then?" he mused, and Dominic smirked knowingly. The janitor would find the missing boy later, stuffed into the school's small excuse for a boiler room.

./. .\.

"All right… all right, I understand, thanks Morgan."

Rossi turned to Reid the boy genius with a stony expression.

"They've just found another body," Reid said in an offhand tone before Rossi could say anything. They were examining Victor Burgess's room, hoping to find some clue that would help lead them closer to the unsub. Reid glanced at the dried puddle of blood on the floor and the overturned chair in the corner of the room. Those were the only things that looked out of the ordinary in the impeccably neat and sparsely furnished room. The forensics team had been through here earlier, and came up with nothing; the place was totally clean.

Well whoop-de-fucking-doo, Reid thought, rubbing his eyes for the umpteenth time that day. He had a chance of getting out of here earlier than expected, and maybe he could curl up on the hotel couch and take a long overdue nap.

But he sighed as Rossi said that they had to check out the new crime scene. It was a boiler room the size of a matchbox in a local high school, and Reid was sure his sinuses would be suffering later.

The agent and doctor took the team's black car and sped through the streets of the Big Apple, swerving and fishtailing when necessary. Reid was suddenly glad that he wasn't driving.

"So what's up, Reid? You don't seem like yourself today."

The sudden question caught Reid off guard, and he stuttered for a few moments before answering, "It's just a little headache, Rossi. It won't affect my performance on this case, I promise."

"It seems like you've been having a lot of these 'little headaches' lately though," Rossi noted as he twiddled the steering wheel, sending the car flying to the left. Then he added, "You've lost weight. And we're all worried about you, Reid."

"I haven't been taking drugs again," the kid retorted, hearing the underlying meaning in his teammate's words. "That is long behind me."

"Just take care of yourself, is what I'm saying."

"Always do, Rossi."

They arrived at the high school in a whirl of red, blue, and black. Yellow police tape was everywhere, and students and parents alike were clustered around, clutching each other and sobbing.

"This is Victor Burgess's high school," Reid noticed immediately. He squinted as another beam of sunlight sliced through his vision, and he had the urge to fall to his knees and clutch the sides of his head.

"So that's progress, I suppose," Rossi pondered thoughtfully. "It's the first real similarity among the victims. And we can cautiously assume that the unsub attends this same high school."

Officer Cazaly walked up to the two agents, his head bowed.

"Have you kept all of the kids in there?" Rossi asked the officer.

Cazaly nodded. "They still don't know what's going on, and we intend to keep it that way. We don't want unnecessary panic just yet."

Rossi nodded too, and, to Reid's chagrin, he said, "Before we question the students, we would like to see the body."

Cazaly led Rossi to the boiler room, and halfway across the courtyard the agent realized that his trusty sidekick wasn't beside him.

"Reid?" he called impatiently. "Let's go! This is no time to drag your feet."

But Reid just smiled sheepishly and waved. He pointed to his head, and Rossi remembered their conversation earlier. Great. Headache. Right. The noise and humidity in the small room would probably make Reid's genius head explode, so Rossi decided not to push it further.

The body was laid out on a stretcher because indeed, the noise emanating from the boiler room was next to unbearable. Alec Chistyakov looked brawny and menacing even in death. Rossi could imagine the thick rolls of muscle rippling when the boy flexed his arm, could imagine the same arm pounding a kid senseless. He was shirtless and he smelled of muddy water and piss.

On the boy's chest, two words were carved with a knife that was left at the crime scene. They were nearly illegible but Rossi, with his years of experience, was able to make out the words, _Help me._

"Help is on the way, my friend," he murmured to himself. Unconsciously he looked back to ask Reid something, but of course boy was still outside in the fresh air.

"We should question the children now," Rossi said instead, turning to Cazaly. "Can you collect as many of them as you can in the gymnasium?"

Fifteen minutes later Rossi and Reid stood in a gymnasium filled to the edges with annoyed and worried teenagers. Rossi held a megaphone in his hand and shouted into it, "Girls may leave!"

There was an excited twittering as half of the people in the gymnasium emptied. The guys shouted out in defiance but a glowering principal calmed them down.

"Guys on sports teams may leave!"

"Why?" Cazaly spluttered in bewilderment. "I thought we were looking for a strong kid!"

Reid glared daggers at the officer, head pounding from the loudness of the crowd, and said, "The unsub wasn't able to carry Chistyakov out of the boiler room. It seems like he tried because of the drag marks in the hallway, but he wasn't able to do it. Also it seems like he doesn't have great hand-eye coordination. So a jock is out of the question."

Rossi jumped off of the platform they were standing on to walk through the rest of the boys who remained, telling some of them to go home. Soon there were only a handful of them left in the gym.

Cazaly gaped. "How the _hell_ did he do that?"

"Just by their appearance and expression you can tell whether they're involved or not," Reid said casually, straightening the collar of his shirt.

"Why are you keeping us here?" a nerdy looking guy shouted in a quivering voice. "What's going on?"

Since Reid had the megaphone on hand, he answered instead of Rossi. "We just need to ask you some questions about one of your classmates. If you would be patient and cooperate fully, then this will go much more quickly."

There was an ominous murmur when Reid had said that they needed to ask about a classmate. What had he done wrong? Was he in trouble? Were _they_ going to be in trouble if they said anything wrong?

The only truly calm one in the crowd was Dominic Beecher, who stood with his hands stuffed into the pockets of his ripped and faded jeans. But his vibrant green eyes darted all around as though he were twitching; they never seemed to rest on anything for more than a few seconds.

_They're going to find you_, a voice whispered nastily in his ear.

_They're going to find you and they're going to send you away._

_They're going to find you and they're going to put your mother in jail to rot there for the rest of her life._

_You'll go to a foster home. You'll be miserable for the rest of your life._

But could he be more miserable than he was now?

The boys followed the agent with the beard and jeans into an empty chemistry lab. There were about twenty or so of them, and they were told just to sit quietly and wait for their turns. The agent with mismatched socks and a sweater vest took their names. He looked down at the sheet of paper and called out the first name on the list:

"Dominic Beecher."

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><p>Dun dun duuuuuuun. We just love those cliffhangers. We might not update for a while because Sara is running out of inspiration for this story. Like we know how it's going to go, but we just need... something. PM us if you have any ideas! Reviews are always welcome ~<p> 


	5. Accident and Emergency

Sara: Yay! Another chapter! Really really short though :( Sorry

Sky: Any inspiration you guys can give us would be amazing. Sara has school now so she'll be totally swamped.

Sara: Sorry sorry sorry sorry. Updating will be a lot slower but we still plan on finishing this! But I have wifi at school. Yay! That should hopefully help me update faster(:

Disclaimer: We don't own Criminal Minds.

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><p>Review time ~<p>

soph: Thanks! We hope you like this chappie :)

Crazy CM Fan100: Thank you thank you thank you for reading since the beginning :) Yes writer's block is absolutely the WORST thing in the world at the moment, but hopefully we can update in another week or so ~

lastbloom: Thanks for reading! :) We hope you like this too ~

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><p>Are You Crazy?<br>Chapter 5: Accident and Emergency

"Please, Dominic, take a seat."

Rossi gestured with one hand toward a puny little desk/chair/thing across from him, and Dominic cautiously accepted the offer. His eyes still darted around everywhere, which Rossi took the time to notice.

"Dominic, do you know Alec Chistyakov?" he prodded gently, pushing a picture of the victim forward as the boy fidgeted in his seat. It didn't seem like a reaction to nervousness, just a constant uneasiness and restlessness.

"He was my classmate," Dominic answered simply. He looked out of the window as to avert Rossi's intense gaze. The collar of his worn shirt hitched down a little, and the two agents noticed a brownish-yellow mark on the boy's shoulder. It could have been a bruise, but then again it could have also been a dirt mark.

"Do you know if Alec was… a bully?" Reid spoke up then.

Dominic nodded slowly. "He would pick on some kids, yeah."

"Were you one of those kids?"

The boy rocked back and forth in the chair, still looking out of the window at a squirrel that quite interested him at the moment. "He stole all my clothes once," he said finally. "When we were showering after gym, he stole all of my clothes and I had to stand in the locker room naked until someone came to find me."

Rossi nodded and made a note. The kid had severe ADHD, probably undiagnosed he presumed. But he had looked through the file of Dominic Beecher before questioning him, and saw that his math and science grades were superb, better than all of his classmates. However, his grades in Language Arts, Geometry, Art, and Literature pulled his grade point average down substantially; now he was barely hanging onto a D+.

"Are you abused at home?"

"No," Dominic lied easily. It was his constant refrain when someone saw the bruises and cuts that covered his body, and to his ears it almost sounded true. "My mother loves me very much."

"Very well," Rossi said dismissively. "You may go now."

As Dominic headed for the door, Reid's eyes bored into his back, scorching his skin even though the doctor still had his sunglasses on.

"We have to watch that kid, Rossi," Reid whispered as the next boy came in, trembling from head to toe.

"But first we have to get through the next nineteen kids," Rossi sighed as he leaned forward, and kid number two threw up all over his black polished shoes.

./. .\.

Dominic ran home. He didn't care if his mother beat him today, he just needed to _get home_. He needed to make sure that the both of them were safe from these awful policemen and they could live together and just be happy.

"Mother!" he cried as he threw the door to their apartment open. "Mother, I'm home!"

Mrs. Beecher padded grumpily through the living room and wiped her hands on the front of her flowered apron. Even with a grimace on her face she still looked beautiful.

Dominic took his mother's hand, an unusual gesture. But before she could protest or relish the feeling of her son's hand in hers, he was dragging her through the front yard and into their beaten up old station wagon.

"Mother, we have to go!" Dominic pleaded, tears forming in his emerald eyes. "The police are going to come, Mother, and they're going to send me away…"

His mother laughed with mirth. "Why would _I_ care if you get sent away, idiot boy?" she sneered. "You're useless to me anyway! _And_ you're going to be insufferable if you miss your counseling."

"But if they find me, they would put _you_ in _jail_, Mother," Dominic argued brazenly. He thought that he might be slapped for these words, but it would be worth it if they could get away in time. It seemed to do the trick though; his mother put the key into the ignition and floored it.

./. .\.

As Rossi went to clean himself up, Reid dealt with the next eighteen kids. They were all quite unremarkable, just scared as hell. His temples pulsed worse and worse after each questioning, but Reid tried to concentrate on the task at hand rather than the pain he was in.

He couldn't think back to what the Beecher kid said. He remembered that when he was a high school student, he also suffered from a similar prank – though it did involve piss-soaked clothes and his boxers hung from the school's flagpole.

The boy was definitely a suspect now, there was no denying it. He fit the profile perfectly, and Reid just assumed that he had lied about being abused; Reid knew personally what bruises looked like. He felt a bit sorry for the boy, because if he was proven to be the killer he would be sent to one of those special hospital zoos and become a guinea pig for the rest of his miserable life.

Rossi came in just then, looking disgruntled, and his shoes weren't as shiny as before.

"Anything?" he asked Reid, who merely shook his head.

"This Beecher kid fits the profile perfectly, though. He might possibly be the killer."

"Yeah, but…" Rossi ran a hand through his graying hair. "We have no _proof_. Just a hunch to go on."

"That may not be the case," Cazaly said suddenly. He put down his mobile. "Dominic Beecher and his mother have just been found outside of the city's borders. They're running, and that's all the proof that you need."

Just then, Reid felt a lance of pain pierce his skull, worse than any of the others before it. Oh god, did it _hurt_. With a cry, he fell to the floor, clutching his head. After a while, he realized he was screaming. "_Make it stop!_" he shrieked as the pain got worse and worse. "_Please, make it stop!_"

"Reid!" Rossi roared and bowled Cazaly over to examine his teammate. Reid wouldn't get off the floor, and he was crouched in a fetal position, holding the sides of his head. The shouting just got louder and louder until his head burst and he passed out.

Rossi fumbled with his phone and dialed a number. "We need an ambulance at George Washington High School! Hurry! We have an agent down, I repeat, an agent is down!"

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><p>Sara: Lol Rossi's shoes. Crappy name for a high school. And noooo I hurt Reid. Sorry :( Review please ~<p> 


	6. I Hate Hospitals

Sara: Sky isn't with me this week, so it's just me to write author's notes/reviews! Hope you enjoy this installment of Are You Crazy? :D And sorry sorry sorry for the late update. I leave home when it's dark and come home when it's dark again. High school life :/ I will probably upload every other Saturday/Sunday.

Just as a warning: Not sure if all my medical procedures are correct. Please correct me if they aren't :)

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><p>Reviews ~<p>

anon: Thanks for the constructive criticism! I will try to work on that. Your observations are spot-on, by the way. I'm barely a high school student, just began my freshman year on Tuesday. Thanks again ~

Crazy CM Fan100: adfajdl;akjf;asdkfasdj have we told you how much we love you? xx Thanks for loving this and sticking with it! (PS we won't feed you any raw onion... yet ;))

SpiderKateCriminalMind: Thanks! We hope you like this chappie too :)

sophie: Thank you! You bet we will :D

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><p>Are You Crazy?<br>Chapter 6: I Hate Hospitals

The EMT squad arrived within minutes. (Damn, how do they do that? Rossi thought. Even _he_ couldn't maneuver the city's maze of streets as well as they did.)

"What happened?" asked one of the technicians as she pushed past Rossi to get to Reid, who was still lying on the floor. The former was nervous to move him in case he injured him even more. Reid's body was still half-curled into a ball, and his breathing was like a person who had been miraculously saved from drowning.

"He's had a bad headache the whole day," Rossi replied. His nerves were a bit frayed at the state of his teammate, but with his experience and attitude he was able to keep a level head. "He collapsed because of the pain and started screaming. He passed out after a few minutes."

The woman nodded. "Give me an IV!" she shouted to someone else in a blue uniform. "Ten milligrams of morphine!"

The team carefully lifted Reid's limp body and laid it on a gurney. The kid's lids fluttered open at the movement, and he looked around for Rossi. But all he saw was white light, and he cried out as his eyes burned and his vision began to fade to black. The EMT stabbed a needle in his arm, rendering him still and silent once more.

Rossi hesitated with his hand on his mobile as Reid was carted into the back of an ambulance and rushed to the hospital. Should he call the team? he debated. Or should he make them focus on the case and tell them when Reid was out of the hospital and fully recovered? But he had no idea how long the recovery could take, and the team would berate him with suspicions soon.

Rossi sighed, and decided to leave the situation alone for a few hours. If Reid wasn't better by then, he would alert the team and deal with the consequences later.

./. .\.

Reid woke up alone. Totally and utterly alone.

Apparently, his frame of mind and memory was still intact, for which he was grateful. Memories of the morning's crime scene and interrogations ghosted past his eyes as though they belonged to someone else and he was merely taking a peek at them. With a dull pang in his chest, he didn't know if he should feel disappointed or not. He knew his team had a case to work on, but really it's not too much to ask for an "Are you alright?" or a "Feel better", is it? Not even the smell of a vase of flowers on his bedside table to comfort him.

He was in a white box of a room, and the lights were dimmed so that everything was tinted with shadows. Reid reached out with his hand but discovered that a heavy clip on his finger and a needle jabbed into his forearm prevented him from making sudden, wide movements.

His mind was still fuzzy from the morphine that the doctor must have given him, so he also didn't know if he was in pain or not. He tried to concentrate on something, but he felt too dizzy and fell back onto his pillows with a soft sigh. He wondered dully if the use of the medication would end up like the last time, him hooked on the drugs and becoming a dead weight to the team. But at the moment he didn't care, because he wasn't in pain.

He winced involuntarily as the memory of his last moment of consciousness flooded his senses. He remembered the screaming, the pounding of his head, his vision blurring and warping…

"Ah, Dr. Reid, you're awake! Excellent. How are you feeling?"

Reid jumped a bit – well, the best jump you can do while you're lying in a hospital cot – and stared at the doctor who was suddenly standing at the edge of the bed. He was dressed in a simple white lab coat looking thing, and was holding a clipboard. He looked well educated enough, so Reid decided to trust him... for now.

"Um… dizzy. I think it's from the pain medication, though." Well, he supposed that that was the best way to put it since his once aching head spun when he tried to sit up.

The doctor smiled sadly at him. "We did an MRI test, and it came back totally clean."

Reid nodded as the words sunk in. It was horrible, like a rerun of his last doctor's appointment.

_I'm not crazy!_

_I didn't say you were, Dr. Reid, but you have to consider the possibility that something is seriously wrong…_

"You've already heard this before," the doctor mused as he took in Reid's obstinate expression.

"I'm not crazy, doctor," Reid said stubbornly, crossing his arms over his chest. "There _has _to be something _physically _wrong with me."

"But Doctor, your tests all came back clean."

"Tests can be wrong, can't they?"

The doctor frowned at him. "I've cross-checked the tests with the older ones found in your files. They all come back the same. You're as healthy as a horse, Dr. Reid"

Reid found himself panicking. Schizophrenia normally presented symptoms at his ripe age, around twenty-seven. He _couldn't_ end up like his mother, he fretted, he _couldn't_. He wanted to continue his work, he wanted to hang out with his team, he wanted the feeling of _independence_. And most of all, he didn't want anyone to have to care for him like he had to care for his mother when he was a teenager.

The older doctor felt sympathy and a tad bit of pity for the younger man. He knew he was brilliant, for who in the medical field hadn't heard of the young prodigy Dr. Spencer Reid? There's a fine line between genius and insanity though, he thought, and it looked like Reid just might cross it. The doctor wanted to tell Reid that he was fine, that he could go home and continue to work or give a lecture or go skydiving even, if that's what he really wanted to do. But that probably be considered as malpractice, and the doctor valued his job and reasonably sustainable income more than his respect for Dr. Reid.

Reid tried to stand up, ripping the needles out of his arm and taking the clip off of his finger. "I'm leaving," he said. "My team needs me, we're working on a case and we only have a few hours, maybe even less, before our unsub kills again..."

But the doctor merely pushed him back onto the bed, his expression grave. "You may feel fine now," he explained, "but that's because the morphine is still talking. Once it flushes out of your system, you're going to be in a lot of pain."

The words did the trick, and Reid blanched. Would it be as bad as when he collapsed in the chemistry lab? He never wanted to feel _that_ kind of pain ever again.

"What's wrong with me?" the genius whispered softly. His eyes were pleading, begging for the doctor to have some answers. But the man shook his head.

"I don't know, Dr. Reid," he sighed. "I don't know."

./. .\.

"Hey, Rossi… where's Reid?"

The team was sitting around the conference table at the police station, just as they had been when they had been briefed about the case at Quantico. Again, Prentiss was the one who noticed that the lanky nerd wasn't trailing dutifully behind the other agent, reciting numbers or facts or narrowing down possible locations on the map that was pinned to the board. He had been missing only for an hour or so, but that was enough time to alert the team that something was going on.

Rossi shrugged noncommittally. "He's still at the crime scene, questioning the kids," he thought on the top of his head. The other agents nodded reasonably, though Morgan narrowed his eyes in suspicion.

"Our unsub is Dominic Beecher, Rossi. He and his mother crossed city borders about an hour ago after you and Reid questioned him," Hotch informed Rossi dutifully, leaning over the file in front of him. The boy's file was open to a school photo taken about a year or so ago; the boy looked uncomfortable under the camera's gaze, and his bright green eyes didn't quite meet the lens.

"It won't be hard to catch him then," Morgan said. There was anger in his voice, as well as irritation. He needed his favourite genius beside him so he could tease him to make himself feel better. "The police stopped the car, right?"

"It won't be that easy," JJ sighed. "Dominic wasn't in the car, just his mother, Gloria Beecher. She said he ran off as soon as they were past city borders." Morgan leaned on the table, holding his forehead in the palms of his hands.

"The police are on the lookout," JJ continued, patting Morgan motherly on the back. "They'll find him."

"Garcia, are you there?" Rossi turned to the computer sitting on the table. A window popped up on the screen, and the team's technical analyst gazed back amiably at her team leader.

"Garcia, I need you to look up everything you can about Dominic Beecher," Hotch recited, still flipping through reports and files. "Look for vacation spots, favourite places… anywhere he would go to be alone."

"Your resident princess will do so and get back to you later," Garcia said in her normal cheeky manner, nodding and typing furiously. The window vanished and Hotch sighed.

"Dominic Beecher," he read off of the pages in the file. "Age sixteen. The school guidance counselor wrote that he shows signs of dyslexia and ADHD that was never treated. His average is a D+ with stronger grades in math and science and lower grades in geometry and literature. His father died nine years ago from a freak car accident that Dominic survived. A report earlier this year says that he was found beaten in the locker rooms, but the attackers are unknown." Hotch looked up at his team who were all staring at him stony-faced. "He fits the profile to a T."

"We need Reid," Prentiss said, holding her head in a perfectly manicured hand. "This kid seems like the kind of person he would be good at relating to."

The other five agents looked to Rossi who returned their glares with an even expression. They knew that something was up with Reid, and the BAU veteran just didn't want to tell them. But what could be so awful? Was their teammate in trouble? And how could they help him?

"Maybe we should go talk to Beecher's mom," Rossi evaded, avoiding his team members' eyes.

"To hell with it, Rossi," Morgan said irritably and pounded his fist on the table, making everyone jump. "You're keeping something from us about Reid, and right now we need him. So you better tell us what's going on before this Beecher kid kills somebody else."

Rossi pursed his lips and hesitated for a moment. Should he tell him? He wondered how they would react. Morgan and JJ would probably want to see how he was doing, Hotch would want to get back on the case, and honestly he didn't really know what to do. "He's at the hospital," he finally admitted.

"What the hell for?" Morgan roared. He stood up and looked like he could murder, and even Rossi cowered under that intense glare.

"He collapsed when we were at the crime scene," Rossi sighed. "He had one of his headaches again."

It was Morgan's turn to sigh. "What are we going to do without our genius now?"

./. .\.

Meanwhile, Garcia was making magic in her tech lab, Kevin Lynch looking over her shoulder and eating a bacon doughnut.

"Ew, Kevin, that's gross," Garcia complained, wrinkling her nose, and Lynch withdrew with a slightly hurt look on his face. Garcia furiously tapped at her keyboard and kept coming up with a red exclamation point when she tried to open a couple of court files.

"Damn. You're hiding something and I'm going to find out what it is..." she muttered to herself. She picked up the phone and dialed the number to the New York district attorney's office.

"Um, Penelope?" Lynch asked timidly, leaning over her shoulder to peer at the computer screen. "Can't you just hack the system and get the files that way?"

"Oh, sweetheart, you're so cute." Garcia grinned and wagged a glittered and feathered purple pen at the man. "I could of course, but I've always valued manners, you know."

A few bad elevator music songs and robotic "please hold"s later, she was directed to an annoying secretary with one of those pink-bubble-gum-and-curly-blonde-hair sort of voices and a bad attitude.

"Hello?" she began in a bored tone.

"Hello!" Garcia greeted pleasantly. "My name is Penelope Garcia and I work for the Behavior Analysis Unit in Quantico, Virginia, and I noticed that some of your files are not accessible to the public. Well, my team needs those files to solve a case…"

"I'm sorry, miss," came the nasally reply, not sounding sorry at all. "Those files aren't allowed to be released, even to this Behavior Analysis Unit you supposedly work for…"

"We are talking about _murder_ here, miss," Garcia said testily, pulling on a loose curl. She was beginning to lose her patience with this woman.

"Those were my orders, so I can't help you…"

"Listen, Miss Grumpy." Garcia's final nerve snapped. She fiddled with the keys and played with her mouse. "You see your cursor there? That's me hacking your supposedly safe network. And now that I've got the files I need, I'm going to teach you a lesson in manners. You know those naked pictures from this year's summer vacation? Yeah, your boss is going to get those in a few minutes. You look hot, by the way. No tan lines."

She slammed the phone down on the receiver and looked to Lynch who was trembling.

"Was that totally wise?" he asked weakly. The unnaturally red-haired woman was back to her old self now, a bright smile stretching her rouged cheeks.

"Oh sweetheart," Garcia giggled, poking his stomach playfully. "You really are too cute."

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><p>Sara: I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE the Garcia scene. I thought she deserved one like this. But I take no credit, it was based off of one of the scenes in an episode that I fail to recall the name of... Anyway, please review ~<p> 


	7. Safe Haven

Sara: Hi everyone! Updating a week early since this chapter is so short. The next one may take a little longer cos I'm still swamped with homework. Ugh.

Sky: Enjoy! Disclaimer: We do not own Criminal Minds. And we're not exactly sure where this park is, we just came up with it ourselves.

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><p>Review time ~<p>

Crazy CM Fan100: Thank you for supporting us! You have no idea how much your reviews help us write :)

SincerelyMNM: Geometry is more logic than math... at least the Geometry Sara took in junior high. Proofs etc. But thanks for the corrections! :)

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><p>Are You Crazy?<br>Chapter 7: Safe Haven

Morgan was pissed. Morgan. Was. Fucking. Pissed.

Rossi was driving through New York City, driving Morgan to the hospital where Reid was staying. Why hadn't he told them earlier? Morgan thought angrily. If the genius had died, would Rossi have kept it from the team too? He sat in the passenger seat moodily, arms crossed over his chest and dark sunglasses shielding his eyes.

"You should have told us, Rossi. We shouldn't have had to ask you about it. You should have told us."

Rossi didn't flinch at the disapproving and _disappointed_ tone. He merely drove on, staying silent.

"Have you heard anything from the doctor yet?" Morgan continued to prod, annoyed at his partner's seeming lack of interest.

Rossi shook his head. "They're keeping Reid at the hospital to run further tests, but all of them have come back clean so far."

They didn't say anything else for the rest of the car ride; both of them were too antsy to even think about their unsub who was on the loose at this very moment.

./. .\.

Dominic's memory was failing him. In this important, brazen, _dangerous_ moment, his memory was abandoning him.

He remembered being here before, in this section of the woods. It could be that this place was close to what he was looking for, or just that he had been there at least a dozen times in the past hour. The trees all looked the same! he thought. If only he could find the lake…

Aah. There it was.

The forest parted to a clearing that had to be hundreds of feet wide and long. Clusters of trees erupted from the ground here and there, their leaves already beginning to change colour. The lake was crystal clear, and Dominic was sure that if he'd had the energy he would have already jumped in. The water would be just the right temperature, and it would soothe his muscles that were sore from the beating and the running and just life in general.

It was almost autumn, Dominic thought as he sat down in a patch of grass. It was such a pity; his favourite season was summer, when he and his father would go fishing in this lake and swim and talk and laugh, and his mother would sit in this same patch of grass and smile, dimples in her round cheeks.

He missed those times. The times when life was fun, _easy_. Now all he could see was darkness and decay ahead.

Six murders. He committed six murders? he wondered. It wasn't really difficult in his opinion. And those people _deserved_ it. They tormented him his whole life, and others as well. He was merely ridding the world of people of the violent, the cruel. What did they gain from their tormenting besides a good laugh?

A light flashes behind his eyes, and he collapses to the ground. The pain in his head makes him want to scream.

_He is standing in the locker rooms, nothing but a towel around his waist. He can hear muffled laughter behind the door, but it's locked and he can't get through no matter how much he screams. It's almost as if he's stuck in the horrible nightmare when you go to school in nothing but your underwear. Except now, his nightmare is becoming a reality._

_Steam from the shower hangs around him like a veil, like a shield, the only shield besides the towel that hangs from his waist. Water drips from his sopping hair into the towel, and he realizes he's shivering._

_It's cold, he realizes. It's so cold._

_Suddenly, the door bursts open and several tall jocks come through, laughing and jeering at him. Oh, how he wish it would stop! He held his head between his hands, falling to the floor, not even noticing the towel slipping off his waist._

"_Hey, Beecher!" the boys sneer. They circle around him like a pack of wolves hunting its prey. "Where's your mummy, eh? Where's the principal? No one's here to bail you out now!"_

_Dominic cries out and tries to escape, but they are too fast. One pins him down, and they are upon him._

_Seconds, hours, minutes later it stops. Dominic is barely conscious to keep track of how many times he was punched, kicked, bruised. He could only think of how it felt like his mother's beatings, except now he was much, much more terrified. He was terrified he could die._

Dominic's eyes snapped open. He was shivering just like he was in his dream, even though it was only brisk. The park was totally silent, not a leaf on a tree quivering in the wind.

"Please stop, please stop…" he murmured to himself, cradling his head in his hands. His head pounded and lights flashed before his eyes. He felt like he was about to faint.

_He is in the very same park, except now it's the end of the summer. It's just beginning to turn cold, but the birds are still singer, the crickets still chirping, and to Dominic it's just… perfect. _

"_Papa!" he calls as a something tugs on his fishing pole. He squirms and tries to reel it in, but he's only seven and is too frail for the fish. His dad comes over to help him._

"_There we go!" he cries and pulls in a big one. It flops in the bottom of their boat, and the man tosses it into a cooler with ice._

_The two, utterly exhausted after yet another day of fishing, carry their haul to the car. Dominic is sad to leave this place, since his times here would surely come to an end soon, and he takes one last glance before following his dad into the car and crawling into the back seat. The latter realizes the time and curses silently._

"_Papa?" the boy asks, eyebrow furrowing in concern._

_He sighs. "You're mum's going to be testy today again, this is the third time we've been late this week."_

"_She's _always_ testy now," Dominic pouts. He crosses his arms over his chest and juts his lower lip out adorably, making his father laugh. The older Beecher twists around and ruffles his son's hair with one hand, taking his eyes off the road for just a moment._

_Headlights fill both of their visions. They're on the highway, too fast to stop. A massive truck fishtails and heads in their direction. They're going to crash…_

"_Dominic!"_

"_Papa!"_

Dominic could still be found hours later in the park, cowering against the grass.

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><p>Sara: Hope you liked this! Poor Dominic :( Review please ~<p> 


	8. Cars, Lakes, and Connections

Sara: Hi everyone! Sorry for the late update ~ homework, you know. Trying not to procrastinate! This chapter is a little bit... all over the place... but that's because this story will end soon! In another few chapters, at least.

Sky: Enjoy! Disclaimer: We do not own Criminal Minds.

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><p>Are You Crazy?<br>Chapter 8: Cars, Lakes, and Connections

"Hey genius, how're you doing?"

Reid started and looked up into the smiling face of his comrade, his partner, Morgan. The man's eyes were crinkled up into a carefree smile, but the dark irises were still tinged with worry and a bit of anger. Reid merely grimaced back, but Morgan took it as the genius's expression for happiness.

The rest of the team filed in behind him, patting Reid on the shoulder or the head and drawing back to stand in the corners of the room. Reid found it somewhat comical that they seemed to be avoiding his gaze.

"Hey guys, I don't bite," he joked half-heartedly, receiving a few weak smiles in return. The only one who didn't seem to be affected by the needles and machines connected to his friend was Morgan, whose grin seemed so out of place in the solemn hospital.

"Genius, you'd better get well soon, all right?" he said in his booming voice. "We need your help to catch this unsub."

"Morgan…" Reid gulped, not quite knowing what to say.

"Ah! You must be Dr. Reid's team. May I talk to you privately?"

The agents all jumped at the unfamiliar voice that came from the doorway. Turning around, they saw a middle-aged doctor in a white lab coat staring at them with a kind of pity.

"Of course." Hotch ushered his team out of the room, not even glancing at Reid again.

"We'll see you later, genius!" Morgan called back, still oblivious. Reid nodded meekly in return.

The team followed the white lab-coated doctor out of the room, and they were all slightly alarmed when he turned to them with a grave expression.

"I believe Dr. Reid is sick," he said. Straight to the point. "I believe he is _very _sick."

"So just give him some medicine and make him better Doc, alright?" Morgan interjected. "We really need him on this case."

"I'm afraid it's not that easy, Agent Morgan."

The whole team was silent at that. So, the doctor began in a tremulous voice:

"I believe you all know that Dr. Reid's mother has schizophrenia, am I right? Schizophrenia normally shows signs in the twenties, and Dr. Reid is twenty-seven. The headaches, the paranoia, and mood swings… I'm afraid he might have schizophrenia…"

"No! Impossible!" Morgan shouted angrily, his carefree mask finally cracking. "He's our genius! He can't have schizophrenia! Impossible!"

"I'm sorry, Agent Morgan," the doctor sighed. "We need to do further tests, but it looks like Dr. Reid isn't going to be working for a while…"

./. .\.

Reid held his head between the palms of his hands, eavesdropping on the conversation going on just outside his door. His vision was blurring, twisting, his head pounding and throbbing. He reached over to the side table and picked up the phone, dialing a number he knew by heart.

"Hello, this is Penelope Garcia, technical genius, at your service!" a bright voice answered, grating through Reid's brain.

"Garcia," Reid said tersely. "Can you have someone bring copies of all the files for this case to this hospital…" He recited the address he found on the stationary next to his bed.

"Of course, darling!" Garcia smiled and began printing out the papers. "I'll get Morgan to give them to you, but why the hospital…?"

"No!" Reid exclaimed suddenly. He looked to the door, afraid that the team might have heard his sudden outburst, but no one peeked in so he decided to keep talking. "Just… anyone in New York, not someone from the team. I'll explain… later."

In DC, Garcia furrowed her eyebrows. What had happened to her little Reid? Was he in trouble? "All right, sweetie," she finally said. "The files are on their way."

"Thanks, Garcia," Reid whispered. Then he hung up.

./. .\.

Not an hour later, Reid found a small package lying on the windowsill just outside of his room. He hadn't seen or heard the messenger, but oh well – Garcia had her ways.

Making sure no one was listening in on him, the BAU's genius kid opened the window. After precariously balancing himself on an ancient faux leather chair, he managed to get the folder inside without any major injuries.

"Give me what you got, Garcia," he murmured to himself as he plopped down on the bed once more. The file contained old school reports, test results, doctor referrals… But Reid wasn't looking for any of that. Reid was looking for _where _Dominic would be at this very moment.

And he was afraid he was going to be too late.

./. .\.

For the next few hours, Reid worked feverishly on the case from his bed, reading at an inhuman pace at 20,000 words per minute, pain momentarily forgotten. When the nurses came in to check on him, he hid the file under the covers, fearing that they might be taken away if they were found.

_I'm going to find you, Dominic_, he thought. _I'm going to save you from becoming what I could have been._

It was then when he found that something – or someone – was missing.

The one link.

The piece of information they had been looking for.

It wasn't in the file.

"Garcia!" Reid snapped into the bedside phone once he had fumbled with the numbers. His hands were shaking, he realized, from excitement or fear he didn't know.

"Yes, my love?" Garcia responded, and Reid could hear her tapping away at her keyboard as they spoke. "Did you get the files?"

"Yes, yes," he answered almost absentmindedly. A heavy stupor clouded his mind as more of the sleeping drugs permeated throughout his blood, but he shook his head to clear it; he couldn't afford to fall asleep at this moment, not when Dominic was in danger.

"Garcia, I need you to find everything you can about Dominic Beecher's father. Nothing about it was in the file." His tone almost sounded accusing.

A pause. More clicks. Reid's head was going to explode from the mere tension between the phone lines.

"Christopher Beecher, born in raised in New York," Garcia began to read off of her screen, "Parents died when he was seventeen, he lived on the streets until he was twenty-one when he married… Gloria Morales."

"And?" Reid pressed, straining his ear to catch every word.

"They had a son named Dominic a year later. They were the American Dream family, with a car in the garage, a chicken in their pot, and a white picket fence to boot. When Dominic was twelve… oh God."

"Garcia?"

"He and his father went on a fishing trip before school started," Garcia said, her voice trailing off to barely a whisper. "When they were going back home they were hit by a truck. Christopher Beecher was killed instantly, but Dominic survived with major head trauma and a few broken bones."

"That's it!" Reid exclaimed, slapping his forehead with the palm of his hand. This was what they were looking for! "Garcia, can you give me the address of the place where the accident happened?

Garcia complied, and listened at the static silence on the other end of the line, almost feeling the tangible excitement coming from Reid.

"Baby?" she asked, concern furrowing her manicured brow. Reid sounded too excited, too scared for her liking.

Reid thought quickly on his feet. The team couldn't know about this, he couldn't tell them; they would just whatever they could themselves and leave him to rot in this hospital bed.

"Garcia, you _can't_ tell any of the others, okay?" he whispered fervently. "This is something I needed to do alone."

The technical analyst nodded slowly and leaned forward to rest her chin in her hand. "Whatever you need to do, Reid," she answered in a completely level tone. "Just be careful baby, okay?"

Reid grinned, the first time that day.

"I always am, Garcia."

./. .\.

Dominic stumbled through the park with no regard of the brambles that scratched his forearms, the tree roots that made him trip and fall on his face, the sun that was burning his crown.

Somehow, he managed to get to the road. It was a busy highway street, one-laned, and for that reason the drivers recklessly went at least twenty miles over the limit. The sound of whooshing wind and stench of car exhaust nearly overwhelmed him, and he found himself cringing into the browning grass on the side of the road.

It reminded him of that day, the last day he had with his father. Himself too, actually. After the accident, his sanity was snatched from him as well, along with his chance at a normal life. Now all he was left with was the paranoia, the fear, and the pain. And his mother would never forgive him for it.

Dominic rose to his feet, his shoulders slumped in loss. He began to trudge forward, his eyes on the ground, his mind singularly fixed on this last act.

He was standing in the middle of the street. Cars were speeding towards him, led by a big black SUV. It was too fast to stop, Dominic thought. He could only close his eyes and spread his arms, expectant.

Did your life really flash before your eyes before you died? Dominic wondered. Did pictures of your childhood really come to you, moments you had never remembered before?

Dominic didn't believe this. He couldn't see anything but the SUV in front of his shifting green eyes. And he stood there in the middle of the road, waiting for Death to come.

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><p>Sara: Cliffhanger? Sorry I didn't mean for that to happen. -_-' So... see what happens to poor Dommy... next chapter ^^' Review please ~<p> 


	9. We're All Going

Sara: Hey guys! Um... do you remember us? ^^ Sorry sorry sorry for not updating for so long, but school has kept me swamped! D:

Sky: Anyways, this is ALMOST the end of the story, but there will be another chapter or two left... which should be up...

Sara: ... soon...

Sky: ... hopefully.

Sara: It shouldn't be two long, like two weeks or so. And then we'll go back and edit all of our chapters ^^

Sky: Anyway, enjoy this (semi) last chapter of Are You Crazy!

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><p>Review time ~<p>

Crazy CM Fan100: asjdfkl;jdsakl;fjdkl;a WRITER'S BLOCK. The worst kind is when you know what you want to say but you don't know how to express it. But thank you thank you! (etc. etc.) for sticking with us despite our long periods between updates! *virtual cookies for you!* :3

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><p>Are You Crazy?<br>Chapter 9: We're All Going

The car was moving too close. Moving to fast. It was going to collide with Dominic's frail body.

_Dominic!_

_Papa!_

He closed his eyes, and his head pounded at the memory of screaming. What else could he do? His breathing quickened, making his chest rise and fall rapidly, almost like a dying rabbit. His cheeks were too flushed; from fear or excitement he didn't know.

It was what he deserved, Dominic thought. If he hadn't been in the car, if he hadn't begged his father to go on that fishing trip, if he hadn't let him take his eyes off of the road…

His father would still be alive.

He killed his own father.

_Murderer!_ his head screamed.

What was it that he had learned in church? An eye for an eye, a foot for a foot…

A life for a life.

That's what it took, wasn't it? A life for a life? Then his sins would be over with, repaid. He would ease his guilt by taking the last thing that was precious to him.

Should he feel afraid? Regretful? Should he just _run away _right now and save himself like his instincts told him?

No, he told himself firmly. No. He had to make his father proud. He had to be strong for him. But most of all, he had to be strong for himself. After years of cowardice, after years of silence, this was the one thing that would absolve him from it all. Bracing himself, he waited for the crash that would end everything.

It never came.

./. .\.

Reid drove half-blind to the park, pain lancing his head with every twist and turn of the road. Damn these New York streets! He slammed his foot down on the gas pedal and swerved in between cars on the highway, ignoring the angry beeps and shouts he got in return.

There was a certain exhilaration to this, this car chase. Adrenaline pumped through his veins, making his heart pound, his breath quicken. In the past his team had gotten all of the action while he stayed at the office, calculating numbers or reading files. If Reid weren't so scared at the moment, he probably would have been thrilled.

With a growing sense of panic, Reid realized that he might be too late. Who knows what Dominic could have done to himself in the time he was missing? How could he not seen the signs? he scolded himself. How could he have not figured it out sooner?

Unknown to Reid, there was a figure standing in the middle of the road, his arms outstretched as if he were being crucified. His head was bowed, his feet together, his entire body drooping as though from defeat.

Reid was going to fast to stop. His hands tightened on the steering wheel, his shoulders grew stiff, and his foot somehow found the brake pedal.

With the nauseating smell of burning rubber, the SUV fishtailed to the side, skidding to a stop a few feet away from the boy. Reid clambered out and held his hands by his shoulders, a sign of peace. The sound of car horns and the head-splitting screeching of tires reached his ears, and he had the sudden urge to cringe into the concrete.

"Dominic Beecher!" he shouted instead. "This is Doctor Spencer Reid from the FBI. I want you to put your hands behind your head and slowly get on your knees."

The boy's head snapped up and his wide green eyes looked at Reid with a mixture of fear and relief. They no longer flickered, but focused on Reid so that the latter could almost feel the intensity of his gaze.

"Am I dead?" Dominic whispered in a shaking voice. "Is this Hell?"

Reid walked a few steps closer as the boy retreated, and he held his hands out to him, pleading.

"No, Dominic," he answered. Other people were beginning to get out of their cars and stare at him, wondering what the commotion was about. Some of them even preferred to run over the kid than be late for their appointments.

"No, Dominic," Reid repeated when the boy closed his eyes, trembling. "You don't deserve to die."

Dominic shook his head and began to rock back and forth on his heels. His eyes darted all over the place, to Reid, to the cars, to the people, to the forest. "I killed my father!" he cried suddenly, a sob making him choke on the words. "I killed him!"

"It was an accident, Dominic," Reid beseeched. "A random car accident. No one was at fault, especially not you."

"I killed him!" Dominic countered again. His hands dropped to his sides and he held a stance as though he were shielding himself from Reid. For what? the agent thought. He would never, ever harm the boy.

He was pulled back to the scenario when Dominic cried, "A life for a life! I deserve to die!"

And with that, he pulled out a short switchblade from his pocket and pointed it at his throat.

There was a collective gasp from everyone who stopped to look at the two in the middle of the street. Some people moved forward in an attempt to help, but others held them back – it would be best if they didn't get involved.

"Dominic!" Reid gasped. He could see drops of scarlet blood already beading at the point of the blade where it touched the pale skin.

"Forgive me!" the boy cried. Tears leaked down his cheeks and into the collar of his shirt. He wanted to badly just to _do it now_, but he couldn't bring himself to end it with a slash of his knife.

"Dominic!"

Reid was begging, pleading with the boy. Couldn't he see? Couldn't he see that this would ruin his life, his future? Couldn't he see that there was so much more to live for?

"Why? Why me?"

The question shocked Reid, even though he almost expected it. Why did bad things happen to good people? he wondered. Dominic's father didn't have to die, his mother didn't have to beat him… why him?

"I don't know, Dominic," Reid answered softly. "I don't know."

There was a painful silence. Several bystanders shifted on their feet impatiently, on the edge of helping and simply driving away.

"Am I crazy?"

At this, Reid was lost for words. He kept opening and closing his mouth, but no sound came out. The horribly serious face of a doctor flashed before him.

_I'm not crazy, Doctor!_

He looked into the boy's eyes, wide with fear and guilt, shifting unconsciously. In truth, he pitied the child, for he too could have turned out the same way if he hadn't escaped into a world of killers and mysteries.

What would have happened if he hadn't? What would have happened if he decided to become like Dominic, always afraid of the people Reid now loved? Would the team be profiling him right now as he brutally murdered innocent people?

No, he firmly told himself. He would never, ever become like that. Never.

So he had to save this boy now, before it was too late.

"Please Dominic," he said wildly, willing to do anything to stop the boy from drawing the knife down. "Think about your mother. Think about your _father_. They wouldn't want you to do this!"

Although the knife quivered, Dominic pressed it further into his flesh, and a steady trickle of blood inched down to his wrist.

"My mother doesn't care because my father is dead! I killed him!" he reiterated as the knife's point dug deeper and deeper into his skin. The light reflected off the blade, nearly blinding Reid.

"It wasn't your fault, Dominic. It was no one's fault."

The boy gulped, a mixture of sweat and saliva beading on the crease of his lips. He wanted to trust this strange man who seemed to know so much, but could he really let himself be hurt again?

"How can I trust you?" he asked aloud. "How do you know they won't ship me away? They'll think I'm crazy, they'll think I'm… I'm not crazy! They deserved it! They all deserved it!"

The answer was wild, almost maniac. The boy was partially hunched over in a sort of pain and grief that was similar to what Reid was feeling right now. Reid's heart skipped a beat and his stomach twisted into knots as he realized what he had to do. This was it, wasn't it? This is what it took to save the lives of others? Risking his own in the process? Reid screwed up all of the remaining courage he had left in him and said:

"They think I'm crazy too, Dominic. I think they're wrong, but… I have to trust them, Dominic. Think of all of those kids you killed. Is that really what you pictured your life to be? Bloodlust and death?"

And he held out his hand, silently urging the boy to drop the knife and take it.

"We can go together, Dominic," he continued in a imploring tone. "We _will_ go together. And that's… that's why you have to trust me."

There was a long silence. For a moment, green eyes met warm brown ones. The two looked at each other as though they were equals, rather than man and boy. They had the same problems, the same desperation to prove their self worth. But in a second that could all change. One tiny movement was all it took.

With a loud clatter, the knife fell to the concrete, spinning for a while until the tip stopped to face Reid. He kicked it away and lurched forward toward the boy. But instead of handcuffing him, he took him into a fierce embrace.

"I'm so sorry," Dominic choked out. "I'm so, so sorry."

"It's alright," Reid whispered back, making soft consoling noises while the boy sobbed into the fabric of his shirt. "Everything's alright now. No one is ever going to hurt you again. I promise."

Some people honked their horns in impatience. Some people got out of their cars. Some people even clapped. But Reid didn't care. All he could focus on was the boy, finally safe in his arms.

When the great Benjamin Franklin was lying on his deathbed with his wife by his side, he was in a feverish state. In his last moments, his wife kept holding to his hand, crying, "I want to go! I want to go too!" And with the last bit of his strength, Franklin turned to her and said:

"We are all going."

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><p>Sara: Wow... I think I actually like this chapter :D Especially the end. That quote I found in a brilliant book called <em>Looking for Alaska<em> by one of my favorite authors, John Green. Anyways, enjoy! Look for the next chapter up soon! And comments are always welcome :3


	10. Where We Belong

Sara: Hey guys! I'm actually really proud that I'm updating within three weeks~

Sky: ... I am very sorry that we are happy when we still update horribly late

Sara: *sticks tongue out at Sky* ANYWAY this is the last legitimate chapter of Are You Crazy. But don't worry, there will be an epilogue~!

Sky: And then we'll go back and edit all our other chapters.

Sara: So... enjoy! We do not own Criminal Minds ~

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><p>Review time ~<p>

A'marie-Ann-Stones: Thanks! We hope you enjoy this chapter ~

pipinheart: Thank you so so much for reviewing our other chapters! Virtual cookies for you :3

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><p>Are You Crazy?<br>Chapter 10: Where We Belong

Dominic thought he would wake up in a hospital. He hated hospitals. They were too peaceful, too clean, too quiet… But worst of all he hated the doctors. They treated their patients like children, as though they were unable to defend themselves, and Dominic hated it. He was not a simple child.

But he didn't wake up in a hospital. Quite the contrary, he found himself lying in his own bed, staring at the chipped-paint ceiling of his room.

Was it all a dream?

Impossible.

He cried. He had no idea how long, but he cried his poor little heart out. _Let it end!_ he begged, wishing someone, somewhere would hear. _Dear God, just let it end!_

"Dominic." The far-too-close voice stunned him into silence, only broken by a few hiccups. When Dominic was able to calm his heart, he looked to his right to find a tall, emaciated, smart-looking man sitting on a chair next to his bed. The face looked thinner, the clothes hanging off the man's body like rags, but he smiled. He looked awfully familiar…

"_You!_" Dominic gasped, nearly pointing in earnest. This man, this man was the agent who saved him from none other than himself.

Again, the man smiled. "I suppose you remember me, Dominic," he said, his voice barely higher than a pained whisper, "even though we have never properly met. My name is Dr. Spencer Reid, and I'm from the Behavior Analysis Unit of the FBI in Quantico, Virginia."

The man called Dr. Reid stretched his hand to the boy, who was still holding his to his chest in that moment of terror. The hand hung there for a while, and Dominic could see an authentic-looking thread bracelet on the thin wrist.

"A lot of old African tribes use thread bracelets to ward off spirits, Dr. Reid," Dominic said softly as he continued to stare at the man's wrist. Reid withdrew his hand in something akin to shock, and the boy's eyes were alight with understanding.

"You seem to be very bright, Dominic," Reid commented, not taking his eyes off of the boy who was now fidgeting with unease. "It's a shame that your teachers never recognized your talent."

"I'm good at memorizing things," the other shrugged noncommittally. He glanced out of the window, though his vivid eyes kept darting to Reid every few seconds. But Reid didn't say anything for a long time. He was too scared, too nervous… Of what? he wondered. Screwing up? Making promises he couldn't keep?

"Dominic," he said slowly after a while. He paused, thinking about what to say. "Do you… do you realize what you did?"

"Yes," the boy answered without hesitation. He continued to stare out of the window as though something outside particularly interested him at the moment, but his words were still clear and direct to the agent. "I killed those people. I'm going to get punished, for that, right?"

He turned his head toward the man next to him and smiled. It wasn't a happy smile. It was a smile of understanding, of acceptance. Reid could only wonder how this boy had been perceived as incompetent and dull by many of his teachers.

Dominic turned back to the window and leaned his head on the wall. Closing his eyes, he gently fingered one of the hidden bruises by his ribs – though, he supposed, he had already undergone a full body inspection after he had passed out in Dr. Reid's arms before.

"My mom always punishes me," he murmured thoughtfully, wincing as he pressed too harshly on his sensitive flesh. "Is it going to be the same where I'm going?"

"No," Reid answered without thought. He shook his head almost violently, making his vision warp and spin. The damn headache had gone (thank God), but the sensitivity to even the dimmest light drove him insane.

"No," he repeated in an undertone. "No one is ever going to hurt you again, I promise you Dominic. I won't let them."

The boy's green eyes flashed. Was it malice Reid saw in them? Bitterness?

"You made a promise to me before, Dr. Reid. Do you intend to keep that, too?"

Needless to say, it was silent for a long time after that.

Of course, Reid wanted to console the boy, tell him that they would be safe, together, and if he ever had to suffer then Reid would suffer along with him. But of course, Reid couldn't make that promise.

It was a spur of the moment thing, right when Dominic was about to take his own life. But now, with a potential – no wait, _confessed_ – serial killer lying on the bed before him, he knew what the team would say.

_It's protocol, Reid. You're an agent and he's the unsub. He's dangerous._

_Let it go, kid. It's not worth it._

_Oh sweetheart… I would hack into all the networks and databases in the world to help you, but your Super-Duper-Technical-Genius would get her license revoked if she did so…_

Dominic pulled his knees to his chest, put his head against the small crevice between his legs. His breathing was shallow, needy. As if he didn't know how many breaths he would have left.

"Leave," he whispered shakily. "I need to think."

"Dominic, I – "

"I said _leave_!" the boy shouted, still not lifting his eyes to meet the agent's. Reid stood up silently and slunk out of the house, his hands in his pockets.

As soon as he heard the door close, Dominic began pacing. It wasn't one of his usual habits (did he even have habits anymore?), but it made him feel better. It gave him less time, less mental capacity to think. But he knew what he must do nonetheless.

With a sigh, Dominic plopped himself on the bed and weighed his options. Spatial thinking had never been one of his specialties, especially after the accident, but at a time like this, a person could only rely on what was available to him, right?

So. Down to business.

On the one hand, he could simply hole himself up in a jail cell, never to see the light of day again. Never hurt anyone, never speak to anyone, just him and the four white walls and – hopefully – toilet.

It would drive him mad – well, madder than he already was, for that matter.

On the other hand, he could trust this… this… Dr. Reid creature. They would go somewhere, somewhere together, and… and…

Dominic's throat closed, and he collapsed on the bed, unable to breathe. His chest swelled and positively ached with some unknown emotion. What was this feeling? he wondered. This strange, strange happiness that was threatening to overwhelm him?

Was it… hope? That was it. Dominic was hoping, no, God! He was _praying_ that this man would be his savior, his salvation. Dr. Reid would keep him safe from the police, his mother… And most of all, Dr. Reid would keep him safe from… himself.

Dominic stood up and walked out of his room, assuring himself that he would never see it again, but taking no second glances. His decision was made.

./. .\.

Outside, Reid was squirming with anxiety. Obviously, leaving a boy – who had just recently attempted to slice open his jugular, by the way – alone iin his home was perhaps not the smartest thing to do. Hell, it was probably one of the most idiotic things that the BAU's prodigy had ever done. After all, he never really worked well when the pressure in his head was on the brink of making him explode.

A soft, faint knock on the door.

After several minutes of complete silence, Reid jumped a foot in the air. Calming his heart, the agent opened the door to see the boy standing inside the threshold. Dominic held out his hands to Reid, expectant. There was something in those eyes, those deep emerald orbs, something that Reid could only wish he could understand. Tears sparkled there, but they were happy, relieved tears. The agent seemed to know what the boy was thinking without uttering a word.

"Dominic Beecher," he said softly, pulling something out of his pocket. "You are under arrest for the murders of Emily Chazen, Eugene Coulange, Karina Manetas, Emmett Falke, and Victor Burgess. Anything you say can and will be used against you. You have the right to have a lawyer present with you at all times…"

_Click._ The handcuffs brought both the boy and the man back to reality. This was real, this was happening… They had both admitted defeat.

But instead of protesting, instead of crying out or being angry, Dominic merely smiled.

"Take me away, Dr. Reid," he whispered as he closed his eyes and leaned his face to the heavens. "Take me away to where we belong."

And with that, the boy and the agent clambered hand in hand to the car, neither one speaking to another, and drove away.

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><p>Sara: Yay, updates! Hope you enjoyed this last chapter, look for the epilogue soon! And fanfiction is screwing with my screen, so the formatting may be a bit weird today... Anyway... comments and criticism are always welcome! :)~<p> 


	11. Royal Game

Sara: Holy. Friggin. Crap. THIS IS THE END GUYS! :D

Sky: The final installment of Are You Crazy? is finally here!

Sara: Thank you so much for sticking with us even though we were really crappy at updating! After we publish this epilogue we're going to try to go back and edit our chapters.

Sky: We're thinking about focusing on parallelling the story to a chess game.

Sara: Anyway, look for it sometime soon! And once again, thank you all the readers and favouriters and reviewers, etc. etc. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: We do not own Criminal Minds.

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><p>Review time ~<p>

Nerd-herd-27: Kyaaaa, we love Looking for Alaska. Was Paper Towns really that good? We should read it soon :)

BookWorm and Geek: Thank you thank you thank you thank you! :D

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><p>Are You Crazy?<br>Epilogue: Royal Game

Spring. A time of new beginnings, or so the saying goes. Dominic so wanted to believe it because spring was finally, _finally_ when he'd be able to get out of this hospital. Start a new life, without pain, without fear. But with… what? What did he have besides this god-awful place with its white walls and horrible, horrible food?

"Check."

Dominic's head snapped up sharply at the playful voice. He scowled as Reid snickered at him, already confident in his win.

_Damn you, over-confident genius prodigies._

Dominic quickly analyzed the chessboard, noting the positions of his knight, bishop, and queen. And slowly, slowly he began to smile.

"I will win in five moves," he announced as Reid frowned, raising his eyebrows just slightly. And then, Reid glanced at the board, and his eyes widened. With an almost final motion, he flicked his king to the side so that it rolled on the table before dropping to the floor.

"Congratulations," he chuckled genially, stretching his arms over his head. "I haven't played such an amusing chess game since I lost spectacularly to my former boss."

"Sounds… amusing."

This was how they normally spent their days. Up at dawn. A light breakfast of toast and orange juice, some schizo meds on the side. Physical activity until lunch. Chess games until dinner. Books until bed.

It was monochromatic. Dull, sure. But it was comforting to be free of disorder, of the chaos of the outside world. The two weren't sure if they welcomed it or resented it.

"We're leaving today, Dr. Reid," Dominic noted, his tone as trivial as if he were commenting about the colour of his shirt. The agent ran his fingers to his once-again-hacked-off hair, contemplating his answer.

"It'll be weird leaving here, eh?" the boy continued. Reid nodded almost to himself.

"It'll be… refreshing, I suppose," he agreed. "I'll miss not being treated like a child, though."

Dominic made a face, playing with the frayed hem of his shirt. He heard Reid's lighthearted chuckle, something that had been so rare before they had come to the hospital.

"What'll you do… after we leave?" Dominic questioned in an undertone. It was something that the both of them had contemplated frequently, yet neither of them had ever made a decision. It was now or never though, and it seemed that the time was now.

Reid sighed. "I'm not sure," he admitted, colouring a bit with something akin to shame.

"I'm sure they'll take you back at the FBI," Dominic said, now rolling one of the chess pieces in his fingers. Reid couldn't help but notice that the penetrating green eyes were no longer flickering, but focusing solely on their owner's hand. The agent smiled, noting to praise the doctors for their excellent help later. After a while, he shrugged.

"I'm not so sure, though. I'll probably take up something else, like teaching. What FBI agent has been known to have a severe case of schizophrenia?"

For a while it was quiet except for the soft clicking of the wooden chess pieces as they set up the board again.

"What do _you_ plan on doing, Dominic?" Reid asked, moving his pawn forward two spaces to start the game. It was the boy's turn to shrug.

"What person would want a schizophrenic former serial killer working under him?" he countered in a bored sort of tone, moving his bishop forward two squares diagonally. They continued to move their pieces, their strategies as careful and precise as a politician's word. Their dance finally ended when Dominic managed to pin Reid's king once again.

"Check," the boy murmured softly, then smiled. "If only life were as simple as a chess game."

Reid nodded in agreement. "Then you'd be quite a winner, eh?" he chuckled, then frowned as he saw a nurse walking toward them. She was looking quite happy – a good sign.

"You two are all set to leave!" she said cheerfully, coming to a stop in front of them. She noticed Reid's overturned king and a pile of chess pieces on the floor. "It seems like I came at just the right time."

Reid laughed and stood up, staggering a bit with his heavy luggage. "Ready to go, Dominic?" he asked the boy, who was already making his way out of the room, the wheels of his suitcase clicking rhythmically across the linoleum floor. It was as much an answer as anything.

Meanwhile, the nurse began listing things off the top of her head, warning the soon-to-be-former patients. "Remember to take your medicine twice a day with food, and don't do any strenuous physical activity for a few weeks… Oh, and you shouldn't eat anything too heavy either, and make sure your stress levels are minimal…"

Dominic flashed a grin at the nurse. "Don't worry ma'am, we'll be fine. You shouldn't expect us back here except for friendly visits." He winked, and a faint blush spread across her cheeks.

The boy and the agent walked out of the hospital, almost mirror images of each other from behind. They didn't care what they were going to do or where they were going, but to them it was fine not to know. All they hoped was that it was going to be beautiful.

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><p>Sara: And there it is! The end! Denouement! Finale! Whatever you want to call it :) Again, thank you so much guys for reading. We hope to see you soon!<p> 


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